After Nara, we all slept like stone dogs, getting 10 or more hours of sleep and barely registering our pricey hotel! The next day – the last of our whirlwind Kyoto trip – was reserved for the sights of Kyoto itself.
Now the guides say Kyoto can be appreciated in a few days, or at best a week. We had one! KLS and I had been here before 11 years ago, and I asked the concierge which sights were recommended in one day and she gave four suggestions. Soon we were on the bus to the first, Kinkakuji Temple (the golden pavilion):
Or, as it may have looked in a 1950s technicolour travelogue:
Beautiful isn’t it? The wooden structure is lacquered with gold, and sits next to a garden (the lake) which is considered one of the greatest in all Japan. To see it in person is quite a sight.
Here is a slightly different perspective:
As with all tourist sights here in Japan, Kinkakuji was mobbed with school kids. Given it was 93F, with almost no breeze and little shade, I felt sorry for them in their long pants, dresses and sleeves!
We quickly felt the heat as well, and I had a bit of a turn at the temple, succumbing to vapors that drained my life rapidly. We decided to head directly to another famous temple on the other side of Kyoto, then call it a day.
Upon arriving at the new location, we found a stall…
Selling a product called ‘potatornado’:
Which was delicious, especially with shaved ice!
Rapid consumption of such treats restored my HP quickly!
That is a pile of sand, intended to symbolize Mt Fuji, in the gardens of Ginkakuji, another famous temple in Kyoto.
As with Kinkakuji, it was built over 500 years ago when Kyoto was the Capitol, and today is one of the national treasures of Japan.
It was during exploration of the beautiful gardens on Ginkakuji that someone who shall be named only as ‘Francis’ was heard to utter: “When does this death march end?”
He was referring to the stairs, and the heat, and the two weeks of exhaustion. It was time to leave the heat and find solace in air conditioning, and that we did!
The above shows Francis Bernard enjoying lunch, and here he is a bit later after some mall shopping:
The tray contains the 8th, 9th and 10th shaved ices of the day, all but one of which had been lemon flavour! It would not be an exaggeration to say the ambrosial quality of the sickly sweet arctic treat had saved us from an early grave in the Kyoto heat!
Later in the day our train arrived to return us to Tokyo. Immediately after boarding we ate dinner:
And then this happened in the seats next to me:
While I chilled out and enjoyed the ride…
